


Duke University Libraries 

Slavery, a divi 
Conf Pam 12mo #402 



i^K3^ -^©^ 

- SLAVERY 



A DIVINE INSTITUTION 



BY J. R THRASHER, 

OK rORT OIBSON. 



A. SJr»EKCI-I, 

UKDK REFORE THE BRECKINRIDGE AND LANE ('LIB, 



Nt)veml>er Tjlli, 1H(~0. 



POUT GIBSON, MISSISSIPPI : 

.SOUTHERN UEVEILLE BOOK MUD JOB OPPICK. 

18C1. i 




George Washington Flowers 
Memorial Collection 

DUKE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 



ESTABLISHED BY THE 

FAMILY OF 

COLONEL FLOWERS 



R-!i. 



CORRESPONDENCE. 



Port Gibsox, Miss., Dec. 21, 1860. 
John B. Thrashee. Esq. — Dear Sir : — We have noted, with plea' 
sure, that you in your late speech, presented an able and elaborate 
exposition of slavery in Scripture. In the present crisis, whatever 
throws light upon the origin and progress of our peculiar labor-syi?- 
tem, ought to be submitted to the public consideration. We therefore 
are gratified to request that you will consent to the early publication 
of your learned exposition. 

We have the honor to be your friends, 
HENRY HUGHES, 
H. T. ELLETT, 
JNO. A. B. JONES, 
W. S. WILSON, 
W. St. J. E. PARKER, 
WM. T. MAGRUDER. 
R. SHOEMAKER. 
WM. SILLERS. 



Port Gibson, Miss., Dec. 21, 1860. 
Messrs. Henry Hughes, H T. Elicit, W. St. J. E. Parker and others : 

Gentlemen: — I sincerely thank you for the high-toned and flatter- 
ing courtesy of your late note. Your request for the publication of 
my Scripture Exposition of Slavery, leaves me no choice but to com- 
ply with your wishes. My late speech was delivered on the spur of 
the exciting occasion, and therefore cannot be recalled ; but that por- 
tion which treated the scriptural bearings of slavery, was carefully 
and conscientiously prepared. In fact, I aimed to make out, from the 
Jaws of God, an old lawyer's " Brief in Defense" of our labor system- 
An ample reward for my pains and trouble is a request for publication, 
coming from gentlemen who are known to be scholars and critic*?. 

Yours, respectfully, 

J. B. THRASHER. 



SPEECH 



OF 



J. B. THRASHER, ESQ. 



FELLOW CITIZENS :- 

I have been speaking to you of the origin of Abolitionism. I have 
pointed out to you its rise among the Red Republicans, in the Jacobin 
clubs of France, during the bloody reign of Robespierre, in which 
the very dregs of society got possession of the government, and ad- 
ministered it, not only for the destruction of royalty, but of aristoc- 
racy, morality and religion ; that in the wild rant of the Jacobins for 
universal liberty and equality, and to remove the last restraint to their 
vicious passions, the Jacobin Assembly decreed that "there was no 
God, and that death was an eternal sleep ;" that some of those Ja- 
cobin Abolitionists transported themselves to the French West India 
Islands, and there preached universal liberty and equality to the 
slaves, which ended in the bloody scenes of St. Domingo — the destruc- 
tion of the white race, and the relapsing into barbarism of the black 
race ; that the abolition creed thus propagated in the West Indies, 
first took root in England; that England, becoming jealous of our 
commerce and northern factories — which were operating upon the 
product of slave labor— induced a Mr. Thompson, member of the 
British Parliament, to visit the Northern States to preach abolition 
there. We ar6 told that, on his first appearance, the principles which 
he promulgated were so abhorent to the people, that he was greeted 
with rotten eggs; but the New England mind being by nature inclined 
to fanaticism and infidelity, Mr. Thompson's doctrine took root and 
spread, and has continued to expand, until the Abolition party will 
probably elect Lincoln President of the United States, upon purely 
sectional grounds, and upon such avowed principles of hostility to 
the South, and the institution of slavery, as amounts to a declaration 
of war against slavery and the South. 

The avowed reason given by Abolitionists for this declaration of 
war against the institution of slavery, is that it is immoral and con- 
trary to the laws of God; that "man can not hold property in man." 

The Southern platform upon the subject of slavery, is that " it is a 
blessing, both to the master and to the slave, and that it is an ordi- 
nance of God." 



6 

At the special request of some of our friends, I will now proceed tQ 
.establish, from the Bible and New Testament, the latter proposition, 
that "slavery is a blessing, and an ordinance of Grod;" at all events, 
that it is an ordinance of Grod, and, as such, must continue till the 
end of time. 

As it regards the proposition that slavery is an ordinance of God, 
we have but few revelations from God, and no records from man, 
except the inspired writings of Moses, during the antedeluvian period 
of the world ; but from this inspired writer it would seem that the 
manifestations of God's providence toward man, underwent some 
change, with the commencement of nations, after the flood; that 
prior to the flood of Noah, there were, perhaps, no carniverous ani- 
mals, and man did not eat flesh. [Gen. i: 29.] Neither had it rained 
upon the earth for a period of sixteen hundred and fifty-six years. 
[Gen, ii: 5, 6.] And to punish the sinful antedeluvian world, God 
had destroyed it, and cut oflP all flesh, by a flood — except Noah and 
those preserved in the ark with him. But that, after the flood, God 
• blessed Noah and his sons, permitted them to eat flesh, and entered 
into a covenant with them that he would not again "cut off all flesh," 
nor destroy the world by a flood. And from this period God com- 
menced the punishment of sin, and sinful nations, in a different man- 
ner, to wit: by slavery, captivity, and death. Gen. viii: 21; ix: 1,2,3. 

After the flood, therefore, in the days of Noah, nations began, and 
slavery began with them. Hence, slavery was, from the beginning, a 
constituent part of every nation on earth ; for we read, in the ninth 
chapter of Genesis, that Noah, who was inspired of God, cursed hie 
grand-son, Canaan, in these words: ^ 

"Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his 
brethren. And he said blessed be the Lord God of Shem; and Ca- 
nan shall be his servant. And God shall enlarge Japhet, and he 
shall dwell in the tents of Shem, and Canaan shall be his servant" 
Gen. ix: 24 to 27. 

It might be well to remark here, before proceeding further, that in 
King James' translation of the Bible and New Testament, great in- 
justice has been done by rendering the word slave into the English 
word, servant. The words, in the Hebrew and Greek languages, 
meaning a slave, are translated servant. The letters of the word by 
which the Hebrews meant a slave — according to the learned and 
critical Dr. Blany, and that indefatigable biblical scholar, Dr. Bs^gs- 
ter — should be pronounced ebed; and, however used and in whatever 
form, is never used in Hebrew disconnected from the idea of slavery. 
[See Fletcher's Studies on Slavery, page 259.] 

The word meaning a slave, in Greek, and used in the New Testa- 



ment, is doula, an orginal Greek word, and, according to all the beet 
Greek scholars, means a slave unconditionally. [See Fletcher's 
Studies on Slavery, page 510.] 

The English word, [servant, into which the Hebrew word, ebed, a 
slave, and the Greek word, doulos, a slave, have been rendered, in 
King James' translation, is derived from the Latin word, servus, a 
slave, and when first introduced into the English language, did as 
distinctly carry with it the idea of slavery as does the present term, 
slave; and will continue'to do so, wherever the English language and 
slavery prevail. 

But let us return and examine, for a moment, this very remar^ble 
curse of Canaan, in its bearing on all subsequent time, at least for 
forty-two hundred years. 

"A servant of eefvants shall he be to his bretkren." That is, the 
nations arising out of the descendants of Ham, or Canaan, shall be 
enslaved by their brethren. This has been true of Egypt, Abyssinia 
the Barbary States, Senegambia, Timbuctoq Dohomey; and in short 
it is true of every native kingdom'in Africa. [See Bayard Taylor in 
Africa; Brown's Self-Interpreting Bible, page 12; Kollins' Ancient 
History, etc.] 

"Blessed be the God of Shem, and Canaan shall be his servant." 
The Chaldeans, Assyrians, Medo-Persians, Persians, Jews, Arabians, 
Hindoos, Indians, (of India) and Saracians, sprang from Shem, and 
each of them, in their turn, made slaves of the descendants of Ca- 
naan—especially the Jews. [See Gen. xiv; Numbers xxi; Joshua 
ix and xix ; I Kings ix: 20, 21, where Solomon reduced one hundred 
and fifty thousand of them to bond service.] 

" God shall enlarge Japhet, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem, 
and Canaan shall oe his servant." We see the English in India, the 
descendants of Japhet, dwelling in the tents of Shem ; and very re- 
cently the English, French, Dutch, Spaniards, Portuguese, and other 
European nations, made slaves of the descendants of Canaan. 

It was, perhaps, Canaan who first saw the nakedness of his grand 
father, Noah, and told his father of it; or the curse may have passed 
over Ham on to Canaan, his son, in consequence of God having pre- 
viously blessed Ham, on coming out of the ark. Thus has this curse 
been literally fulfilled up to the present time. But it is not to end 
here, for Noah does not limit it. Hence we conclude that slavery is 
to continue among men till the end of time. 

These predictions are very extensive. Almost every prediction in 
scripture, relative to the Egyptians, Canaanites, Tyrians, and Zido- 
Tiiana, is compTehended ia thie repeated curse of Canaan. Almost 



8 

every prediction relativelto the Assyrians.fChaldeans, Persians, and 
Arabs, and especially what relates to the 'Jewish nation and Jesus 
Christ, is included in the blessing of Shem. Almost every prediction 
relative to the Greeks, Eomans, Goths, Tartars, and Turks, and 
especially whatever relates to the gospel church among the Gentiles 
is contained in the blessing of Japhet. The fulfillment of these pre 
dictions is no less remarkable. Much of the scriptures of the Old 
and New Testament, much of the history of nations, is no more than 
an account of it. 

Th^descendants of Ham peopled Africa and part of western Asia. 
For aoout forty-two hundred years past, the bulk of the Africans 
have been alfeindoned of Heaven to the most gross ignorance, rigid 
slavery, stupid idolatry, and saVage barbarity. Scarcely ever hath a 
State, formed of them, made any respectable figure. For many ages 
the northern parts of Africa were enslaved or harrassed by the As- 
syrian, Chaldean, and Persian descendants of Shem, and next by the 
Greeks, but especially by the Eoman and Vandal descendants of 
Japhet. For twelve hundred years past they have been enslaved by 
the Ishmaelite Saracens descended from Shem, or^ by the Ottoman 
Turks descended of Japhet. 

But we are drawing rather too largely on history, and will therefore 
return to the curse of God, pronounced, through Noah, on Canaan 
and trace up God's decrees and sanction of slavery, through the books 
of the Old and New Testament, where it will be found, by all who will 
examine the subject, that slavery has ever been a constituent part of 
every nation since this curse was pronounced on Canaan, twenty-three 
hundred and forty-seven years before Christ. 

After about four hundred years' respite, the curs| pronounced upon 
Canaan, broke forth with great violence upon the sinners of Sodom 
and adjacent places, in which five kingdoms of Canaan were reduced 
to servitude by the Elamite descendants of Shem. . [See Gen. xiv.] 
And Lot, Abram's nephew, having been carried away captive in this 
war, induced Abram to raise a military force to pursue the conquer- 
ors, and to retake his nephew. Abram, the favorite of Heaven, who 
entertained angels in his tent, one of whom was the son of God 
[Gen. xviii: 24; John v: 22] Abram, to whom God appeared while in 
Ur, of the Chaldeans, and at least eight times afterwards, probably in 
human shape, and conversed with him, and changed his name to 
Abraham; [Gen xii; xiii; xv; xvii; xviii; xx; xxii] Abram, to whom 
the promise was made, and from whose seed the Messiah was to 
spring, was a large slave holder, and enrolled in his military force, to 
pursue the Four Kings who had carried away his nephew, three hun- 



dred and eighteen slaves, born in hie own house. Rut xlbram had 
other slaves, bought with his money, which he probably enrolled. 
[Gen. xiv : 14 ; xvii : 23.] With these slaves, Abram, after being joined 
by some auxiliary forces, came to battle with the Four Kings, stripped 
them of their spoil, retook Lot and the other captives, returned, and 
iv^s met and blessed by Melcliizedek, priest of the most high God. 
king of righteousness, to whom he gave a tenth part of the spoil, 
Gen. xiv. 

Melchizedek, who blessed Abram, saying: "Blessed be Abram of 
the most high God," was like unto the son of God. Jesus was made 
a priest after the order of Melchizedek. Heb. vii : 1. 

Surely, therefore, God sanctioned the holding of slaves by Abram. 
and why not ? He had doomed one portion of the human race to 
slavery, for sinful conduct, to wit: Canaan and his descendants, and be 
ing slaves by the decree of Omnipotence, as a punishment for sin' 
they must have masters. These masters God had designated in the 
Curse, and Abram was one of them. " Cursed be Canaan, a servant of 
servants shall he be unto his brethren." Gen. ix: 25. 

About two years after this Southern slave holder, who was an espe- 
cial favorite of Heaven, had returned Irom the slaughter of the Four 
Kings, God again appeared unto him, and after promising him seed, 
as numerous as the stars of Heaven, [Gen. xv: 5] informed him that 
his seed should go into slavery four hundred years. Thus it is written: 

" And he said unto Abram, know of a surety that thy seed shall be 
a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them ; and they 
shall afflict them four hundred years." Gen. xv: 13. 

This four hundred years of slavery foretold to Abram, was not to 
benefit the Egyptians, whom they served, for the EgjTDtians were a 
nation of idolators ; but to punish the seed of Abram— who had a 
knowledge of the true God — for sin, and idolatry. 

But to demonstrate still further that slavery is of God, and was at 
all times upheld and sanctioned by him, in fulfilment of his immuta- 
ble laws, we will refer to the case of the Egyptian slave Hagar, the 
hand-maid of Abrams' wdfe Sarai. Hagar had fled from her mistress, 
and the Angel of the Lord found her by a fountain of water, in the 
wilderness. 

"And he said, Hagar, Sarai's maid, whence come.st thou; and 
whither wilt thou go? And she said I fiee from the face of my mis- 
tress Sarai. And the Angel of the Lord said unto her, return to thy 
mistres, and submit thyself under her hands." Gen. xvi : 7, 8, 9. 

In the passages of Scripture above cited, and in many other places, 
the Angel of the Lord or Angel Jehovah, denote Jesus Christ, who 



10 

18 the messenger of the New Covenant, as in CJen. xxii : 11 ; xlviii : If) ; 
Judges, ii: 1; vi : 2; xiii; 3; Mai. iii : 1. So that we find the Lord 
Jesus Christ, the Son of God, before he appeared on earth in the flesh, 
commanding a runaway slave to retur^i and submit to her mistress. 
St. Paul, therefore, had very high authority for sending the runaway 
slave Onesimus, back to his master, Philamon; for the Lord Jesua 
Christ had set him the example, nineteen hundred and eleven years 
before he appeared on earth in the flesh. 
Abraham died eighteen hundred and twenty-one years before Christ ; 
and Isaac, his son by Sarah, inherited his slaves, and other property. 
Gen. xxiv : 36 ; xxv : 5. 

Isaac, too, was a favorite of God and a " Southern" slave holder. 
After the death of Abraham, the Lord appeared unto Isaac, and p^o- 
misedto be with him, and to bless him, and to make his seed multiply 
as the stars of Heaven ; and from his seed the Messiah was again 
promised. Isaac was a large slave holder living in about the latitude 
of the Southern States, and in the language of Scripture " had posses- 
sions of flocks, and possessions of herds and great store of servants, 
and the Philistines envied him," [Gen. xxvi: 3, 4, 14] just as the 
Northern fanatics, envy the slave holders of the South at this day. 

But God had decreed that slavery should exist, as the punishment 
of sin and sinful nations after the flood ; and it was no objection to 
him that Isaac was a slave holder, and in that respect was but fulfil- 
ing the ordinance of his God ; which we suppose comprised religious 
instruction to his slaves, such as the slave holders of the South are in 
the habit of extending to their slaves, at the present time. For we 
read, in the seventeenth chapter cf Genesis, that God commanded 
Abraham to circumcise his slaves bought with his money, as well as 
those born in his house. God appeared unto Isaac a second time and 
blessed him. [Gen. xxvi: 24.] Isaac died about seventeen hundred 
and twenty-seven years before Christ, leaving his son, Jacob, in pos- 
session of his blessing. Gen. xxvii. . 

Jacob, on account of his faith, was another favorite of Heaven. God 
appeared unto him five times, at least, if no more, and conversed with 
him. [See Gen. xxxi: 5; xxxii: 30; xxxv: 1, 9;xlvi: 2.] And when re- 
turning from the residence of Laban, his father-in-law, to Seir or Suc- 
coth, with his wives, his children, his slaves, and his flocks, he v/as 
met by a company of angels as a welcome. [Gen. xxxii : 1.] And 
the Son of God spent a night with him on his way back, at Peniel, 
wrestling with his faith, and then and there changed his name to 
Israel, and blessed him. Gen. xxxii : 24, 30. 

Jacob was a slave holder, and had slaves with him at the time of 



11 

receiving the blessing at Peniel. [Gen. xxx: 43; xxxii : 5.] And his 
two wives, Leah and Kachel, had each received a female slave as a gitl 
from their father, Laban, upon their marriage to Jacob, which slaves 
he had with him at the time of receiving the blessing of the Spn of 
God. Gen. xxix : 24, 29. 

The promise was again renewed to Jacob, that his seed should mul- 
tiply as the sand of the sea, that could not be numbered for multitude, 
and that in him and in his seed, all the families of the earth should 
beblesssed; that is to say, that from his seed the Messiah should 
spring. Israel died in Egypt sixteen hundred and eigty-nine years be- 
fore Christ, leaving twelve sons, who became the heads of the twelve 
tribes of Israel. 

In point of time. Job was the next large slave holder who received 
the blessings of God, and to whom God appeared, and with whom God 
conversed in person. Job lived about fifteen hundred and twenty 
years before Christ, in the land of Uz, — probably about the time that 
Moses lived in the land of Median, or perhaps one hundred years be- 
fore. That Job was an especial favorite of God, we know from the 
fourteenth chapter of the prophet Ezekiel, fourteenth and twentieth 
verses. We do not know the number of Job's slaves, but we know 
that he was a slave holder, and have reason to believe that he owned 
a large number of them ; for we read, in the first chapter of Job, that 
he had 8:ven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred 
yoke of oxen and five hundred she asses, and a very great household ; 
that the oxen were plowing, and the asses were feeding beside them; 
and that the Sabeans took them away and slew the servants with the 
edge of the sword; that the fire of God fell from Heaven, and burnt 
up the sheep, and the servants ; that the Chaldeans fell upon the ca- 
mels, and carried them away, and slew the servants with the edge of 
the sword. From this chapter, it is evident that Job owned slaves 
enough to plow five hundred j'oke of oxen, attend seven thousand head 
of sheep, three thousand camels and five hundred she asses, in separate 
places. The thirty-first chapter of Job, thirteenth verse, alludes to the 
treatment of his slaves But the Lord gave Job twice as much as he 
had before, after the destruction of his property, and therefore doubled 
his slaves. Job, xlii: 10. 

About thirty years after this period, or fourteen hundred and nine- 
ty-one years before Christ, the children of Israel completed their four 
hundred years of bondage in Egypt, as foretold to Abraham, and we 
find them with Moses, the prophet and chosen instrument of God, en- 
camped before Mount Sinai, about forty-seven days out from Egypt, 
to receive the law from God, which was to govern them, as his chosen 



12 

•people. In the laws thus derived from God, we find that Qxyd opened 
the slave trade, sanctioned slavery, and regulated it by Omnipotent de- 
crees, in which he calls a slave his master's money. Thus it is written : 

"And if a man smite his servant, or his maid with a rod, and he 
die under his hand ; he shall be surely punished, notwithstanding, if he 
continue a day or two, he shall not be punished; for he is his money." 
Exodus, xxi ; 20, 21. 

Hence we find that the laws of God authorized the holding of men 

and women in bondage, and the punishment of them with a rod. Also., 

that God, in order to protect the master's rights of property in his 

slaves, did sanction the separation of man and wife, and of father and 

children. For v/e read, in the same chapter : 

" If thou buy a Hebrew servant, six years shall he serve thee, and 
in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. If he were married, 
then his wife shall go out with him. If his master have given him a 
wife;(one of his bondmaids) and she have borne him sons or daugh- 
ters, the wife and her children shall be her master's, and he shall go 
out by himself And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my mas- 
ter, my wife, and my children ; I will not go out free ; then his master 
shall bring him unto the judges; he shall also bring him to the door, 
or unto the door post ; and his master shall bore his ear through with 
an awl; and he shall serve him for ever." Exodus, xxi: 3, 4, 5, 6. 

In the institution of the Passover, we find God distinguishing be- 
tween the hired servant, and the bond slave, bought for money, in 
which he gives the bond slave the preference, and bestows on him 
some of the marks of divine favor which he bestowed upon his chosen 
people. The passage alluded to, reads thus : 

" And the Lord said unto Moses and Aaron : This is the ordinance 
ot the Passover ; there shall no stranger eat thereof But every man's 
servant, that is bought for money, when thou has circumcised him. 
then shall he eat thereof A foreigner and an hired servant shall 
not eat thereof." Exodus, xii : 43, 44, 45. 

Again, we find God for the honor of his sanctuary, prescribing that 
no priest should eat their share of the sacred ofierings, while under 
any ceremonial uncleanness. And therein, he, again, not only dis- 
tinguishes between the bond slave bought for money, and the hired 
servant, and gives the bond slave the preference : but regards the 
purchaser of a soul for money, as pure and without spot or blemish. 
Thus it is written : 

" There shall no stranger eat of the holy thing; a sojourner of the 
priest, or an hired servant, shall not eat of the holy thing. But if the 
priest buy any soul with his money, he shall eat of it, and he that ia 
born in his house, they shall eat of his meat." Leviticus xxii : 10, 11. 

In the passage of Scripture above quoted, God speaks of the pur- 
chase of a soul for money. The soul, we believe, is the immortal part 
of man, which is inseparable from the body during life; but departe 
from it in artiado mortis, and doce not die with it. So that the pur- 



13 

/shaeer of a slave, to wit : of a heathen, or a d^ccndant of Canaan, aO' 
quires both the soul and the body, during Ufa 

Soon after this period, sometime in the year fourteen hundred and 
ninety, before Christ, we find God again sanctioning slavery, and regu 
lating the slave trade from Mount Sanai, by law, in the following lan- 
guage, to wit : 

" Both thy bondmen and thy bondmaids, which thou shall have 
shall be of the heathen that are round about you ; of them shall ye 
buy bondmen and bondmaids. Moreoverof the children of the stran- 
gers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their fa- 
milies that are with you, which they begat in j-our land. And tney 
shall be your possession. And ye shall take them as an inheritance 
for your children after you to iniierit them for a possession: they shall 
be your bondmen forever." Levitcusxxv: 44,45,46. 

Not long before the death of Moses, sometime in the year fourteen 

hundred and fifty-two, before Christ, he went to war with the Midian- 

ites by the command of the Lord. The record reads thus: 

" And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, avenge the children of 
Israel of the Midianites ; afterwards shall thou be gathered to thy 
people." Numbers xxxi: 1,2. 

In this war the children'of Israel took thirty-two thousand captives 
who were divided as slaves among the men who went to battle — the 
congregation levying a tribute unto the Lord of thirty-two captive 
slaves, which were given to the Levites, who kept the charge of the 
tabernacle of the Lord, "as the Lord commanded Moses." Numbers 
xxxi. 

About a month before the death of Moses, he, in the most affecting 
manner, renewed the covenant between God and Israel, and rehearsed 
to them, what God done for them, and the laws which he had given 
them. In this rehearsal, the twentieth chapter of Deuteronomy con- 
tains the laws of the Hebrew wars, derived from God himself, in which 
he ordained, that their captives taken in war should be enslaved. Deut 
XX : 10 to 15. 

Thus stood the law of God in regard to slavery and the slave trade? 
when Joshua succeeded Moses, by appointment of God, as Governor of 
Israel. That Joshua, like Moses, acted under the Lord's direction, and 
with his sanction, no student of the Bible can doubt. The Lord ap- 
peared unto Joshua, after the death of Moses, repeatedly, and com- 
muned with him and promised to be with him "whithersoever he 
went," [Josh, i.] and seems to have conducted all his movements, and 
battles, " as captain of the host." Joshua v : 13, 14. 

The Book of Joshua contains a remarkable fulfilment of God's pro- 
mises to the patriarchs and their descendants, in giving them the land 
of Canaan and the fulfilment of the curse of God pronounced by Noah 



14 

i^pon Canaan in the defilrnction and slavery of his descendants, and of 
God's policy; shadowed forth after Noah's flood, to punish sin and 
sinful nations by slavery, captivity and death, after entering into the 
covenant with Noah and his sons— instead of destroying the whole 
earth, and cutting off all flesh by a flood, as he had before done. 

And thus we find Joshua, acting under the immediate sanction and 
direction of the Lord, enslaving a whole nation — the Gibeonites — 
and making them " hewers of wood and drawers of water for 
Israel." Joshua ix. 

In consequence of the Gibeonites having submitted to Joshua, the 
five kings of the Amoritea formed a league to cut them off, and to de- 
stroy them as a people. The Gibeonites now being the slaves of Israel, 
appealed to Joshua for protection, who marched with his whole force 
against the army of the five kings. It was upon this memorable oc- 
casion, that Joshua, when ostensibly fighting to protect the slaves of 
his people, " Spake to the Lord and exclaimed in the sight of all 
Israel : Sun stand thou still upon Gibeon ; and thou moon in the val- 
ley of Ajalon. And the sun stood still and the moon stayed until the 
people had avenged themselves upon their enemies." Joshua x : 12, 13. 

Joshua, ftfter serving God faithfully, died about fourteen hundred 
and twenty-four years before Christ, and slavery continued to exist in 
Israel, and among all other nations by the sanction of God, and by 
virtue of his Omnipotent decrees ; and doubtless will continue to exist 
until the end of time ; for there is no limit to the curse of Canaan 
whence we date the origin of slavery, as decreed by God himself. Ac 
cordingly we find it sanctioned by God; by the Lord Jesus Christ; by 
the Apostles; and by holy men throughout the books of the Old and 
New Testament. 

King David was a man after God's own heart. The Eedeemer was 
the promised seed of David, Judah, Isaac, Jacob, Abraham and Eve, 
according to the flesh. David enslaved the Moabites, Syrians and 
Edomites, " and the Lord preserved David whithersoever he went." 
[II Samuel viir. 2, 6, 14.] And so common was slavery in his day, that 
when he was fleeing from Saul, and in the wilderness of Paran, that 
he was himself accused of being a runaway slave by Nabal, who was 
shearing sheep in Carmal, and to whom David had sent for provisions. 
" And Nabal answered David's servants and said, who is David ? and 
who is the son of Jesse ? There be many servants now-a-days that 
break away every man from his master." I Samuel, xxv : 10. 

David died about ten hundred andfifteen years before Christ; and Solo- 
mon, the renowned King of Israel, who was endowed with wisdom from 
on high, the son of David by Beth Sheba, Uriah's wife, was chosen o^ 
God to succeed his father David. 



15 

Solomon who built the Temple of God according to a plan furnish- 
ed by God himselt to David, buili it with slave labor, and had one 
hundred and fifty thousand slaves emploj'ed in building the Temple. 
He enslaved the remnant of five nations of Canaanites left in the land 
up to his time. I Kings ix; 20, 21; v: 15, 16. Brown's Self-Interpret- 
ing Bible, page 12. 

That the Israelites, the chosen and favored people of God, were a 
nation of slave holders, and that most of the prophets, and holy men 
of God, owned slaves, no student of the Bible, having any regard for 
veracity, can dispute. Thus w^e find the prophet Samuel trying to per- 
suade the people against a king to rule over them, by telling them that 
a King "would take their men servants and maid servants, and put 
them to his own work." I Samuel v: 16. 

Elijah, the prophet, who was translated to Heaven without tasting 
death, owned a slave, which he left at Beersheba, when fleeing from 
Jezebel. I Kings xix : 3. 

Also the prophet Elisha, oa whom the mantle of Elijah fell — the 
man of God who performed so many miracles, and among others, that 
of raising the dead to life— was a slave holder, and punished his slave 
Gehazi, by afflicting him with lepros3^ II Kings, v. 

The children of Israel were often reduced to slavery themselves by 
God's command for breaking his law, and havig broken their coven- 
ant with God respecting Hebrew slaves, [See Jere. xxxiv: 11] God 
decreed as a punishment,that they should themselves go into bondage 
and serve the King of Bab^'lon seventyyears; which bondage was fore- 
told to them by Jeremiah the prophet, in the year six hundred and 
seven, before Christ. Jere. xxv: 11. 

After the expiration of the seventy years of bondage in Babylon, 
Nehemiah, who rebuilt Jerusalem by commission from Artaxerxes, 
four huadred and forty-five years before Christ, was a slave holder. 
Neh. iv: 22,23. 

Likewise, most of the returned Israelites held Chaldean slaves at 
the time,which had been promised to them, and foretold by Isaiah the 
prophet, seven hundred and thirty years before Christ, and about two 
hundred and eighty-five years prior thereto. Isaiah xix : 2. 

So that we find God ever after entering into the covenant with Noah 
and his sons, constantly punishing sin and sinful natioi.s, whether 
Jew or Gentile, with slavery, captivity and death. Hence we believe 
that the slavery of the negro is of God, v/hich we can trace back to 
the curse of Caanan. 

"A son honoreth his father and a servant his master." [Mai. i : 6.] 
Malachi was the last prophet that God commissioned on earth, 



16 

prior to the advent of the Savior. He Ibretoid the coming of John 
the Baptist, and the incarnation and ministry of Christ. 

Christ appeared about four hundred years afterwards, descended in 
the flesh from a long line of slave holding ancestors, from whose 
eeed he had been repeatedly promised by Jehovah. The pre- 
cise year that the Messiah was to appear and be cut off, and did ap- 
pear, had been foretold by Daniel, the prophet, in Chaldea, four hun- 
dred and ninety years previous thereto. "Seventy weeks are determin- 
ed upon thy people, and upon thy holy cit}^" Dan. ix : 24-27. 

Each of the weeks above mentioned, denotes seven years, a day for 
a year, as we learn from the prophet Ezekiel iv : 6. 

Christ appeared on earth at a time when slavery abounded every- 
where. Barns, in his infamous work on slavery, [page 251, 252] ad- 
mits that in Italy there were three slaves to every free man, and that 
there w^as more than twenty millions of slaves in Italy alone, and not 
less than sixty millions in the Eoman Empire. Consequently, Christ 
and his Apostles came in constant contact with slavery — recognizing 
it upon all occasions, as of divine origin, and giving instructions both 
to the master and to the slave, in relation to their conduct towards 
each other. 

Not long after Christ's sermon on the Mount, we find him healing 
the slave of a Roman Centurion, and restoring him to the service of 
his master, upon the master's application. Mat. viii: 5, 13. Luke^ 
vii : 2, 10. 

We again find Christ recognizing the institution of slavery, as re 
corded in St. Luke xvii : 7,9; xix: 12,16; and St. John viii: 33,36, 

St. Paul the great Apostle of the Gentiles, exhorts slaves to be obe" 

dient to their masters. "Servants be obedient'to them that are your 

masters according to the flesh." Eph. vi: 5. The same doctrine wag 

preached to the Collossians. 

" Servants obey in all things your masters according to the flesh; 
not with eye service, as men-pleasers; but in singleness of heart, 
fearing God." St. Paul's Epistle to the Colossians, iii : 22. 

The Apostles, at a very early period of their ministrj'^, in obedience 
to the divine law, were compelled to encounter abolition fanatics, who, 
like the abolition fanatics of , the present day, inculcated the doctrine 
that the religion of Christ gave liberty and equality to the slaves. 
This was e specially the case at Ephesus, where judaizing abolition 
teachers perverted the gospel. St. Paul's First Epistle to Timothy 
condemns the abominable heresy, and gives us a most graphic des. 
cription of that vile race of beings called abolitionists at this day. Says 
St. Paul: 

" Let ae many servants as are under the yoke, count their own 



17 

masters worthj of all honor, that the name of God and his doctrine be 
not blasphemed. And they that have believing masters, let them not 
despise them, because they are brethren ; but rather do them service, 
because they are faithful and beloved partakers of the benefit ; these 
things teach and exhort. It any man teach otherwise, and consent 
liOt to wholesome words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
and to the doctrine which is according to godliness ; he is proud, know- 
ing nothing, but doting about questions and strifes of words, whereof 
cometh envy, strife, railings, evil surmisings, perverse disputings of 
men of corrupt minds, and destitute of the truth, supposing that gain 
is godliness: from such withdraw thyself" First Epistle of St. Paul 
to Timothy, vi : 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. 

Again, St. Paul in his Epistle to Titus, instructs him as follows:: 

"Exhort servants to be obedient to their own masters and to 
please them well in all things; not answering again; not purloining ; 
but showing all good fidelity that they may adorn the doctrine of God 
our SaN-ior in all things." St. Paul's Epistle to Titus, ii: 9. 

In the First Epistle of Peter, second chapter and eighteenth verse, 
itiswriten: " Servants be subject to your masters with all fear; not 
only to the good and gentle, but also to the froward." ^ 

The Epistle of St. Paul to Philemon was written to a Christian 
slave holder. In this Epistle, we find the great apostle following 
the example set him by Christ in the case of Hagar, nineteen 
hundred and eleven years before he appeared on earth in the 
flesh, and actually sending back the fugitive slave Onesimus, to his 
master Philemon. In regard to the runaway slave Onesimus, St. Paul, 
in King James' translation, is made to say, 'in the twelfth verse of 
the Epistle, "whom I have sent again." Macknight renders the 
words "Him I have sent back." Dr. Macknight renders the term 
applied to Onesimus, in the Epistle to Philemon into the Englisli 
word slave. In like manner, Moses Stuart calls Onesimus the slave 
of Philemon; and Brown, in hia "Self-Interpreting Bible," does the 
same thing. 

Such were the sanction and teachings of the Holy Apostles who 
were taught of Christ and inspired of God, respecting slavery. ^And 
we find the Christian fathers, who immediately succeeded them, incul- 
cating the same doctrine. St. Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, accord- 
ing to the early church historians, was the child whom the Savior 
took in his arms, and set before his disciples as a pattern of humility, 
when he told them that unless they should be converted, and become 
as little children, they should in no wise enter into the kingdom of 
God: And from thence he took the name of Theophorus. [He 
who has Christ in his breast.] Be this matter, however, as it may, it 
is certain that St. Ignatius was the disciple of St. John, "and like unto 
the Apostles in all things." St Chrysostom tells us that he was inti- 
mately acquaint^ with the Apoetl^, and instructed by them- That 

3* 



18 

'he was ciioeen by the Apoetles that were Btill living to be Bishop of 
Antioch, and received imposition of hands from them. 

St. Ignatius, in his second Epistle to St. Polycarp, who was also a 
disciple of St. John, says: " Overlook not the men and maid servants, 
let them be the more subject to the glory of God, that they may attain 
from him a better liberty. Let them not desire to be set free at public 
cost, that they be not slaves to their own lusts." St. Ignatius suffered 
martyrdom, for his religion and faith in Christ, under Trajan. 

St. Barnabas, the companion of St. Paul, and according to the 
early church historians, the disciple of Christ, was one of the seven- 
ty chosen by him. He was the competitor of Mathias. His first 
education was at the feet of Gamaliel, by whom he was instructed, to- 
gether with St. Paul, his class mate. . But whatever may be the testi- 
mony of the early church historians in relation to St. Barnabas, it is 
certain, from the testimony of St. Luke, that he was a good man, and 
full of faith, and of the Holy Ghost. Acts xi : 24. 

In the Catholic Epistle of St. Barnabas, nineteenth chapter, he says : 
" Thou shall not be bitter in thy commands towards any of the ser- 
vants that trust in God; lest thou chance not to fear him who is over 
both ; because he came not to call any with respect to persons, but 
whomsoever the spirit prepared." 

Thus we find that God has ordained one portion of the human race 
to be bond slaves, from the period whence nations commenced— and 
that he has transmitted to us his decrees on the subject, through his 
inspired writers and vicegerents on earth, we cannot doubt. 
That the greater portion of the human race, thus ordained to bond 
service by Omnipotent decrees, have ever been far in advance, in point 
of intelligence and civilization to the negroes, whom we hold in slave- 
ry. That the negroes whom we hold in bondage, are the lowest 
and most degraded of the descendants of Canaan, and never enjoyed 
freedom in their own country, for the best of all reasons; first, be- 
cause they were incapable of it; secondly, because they were slaves 
in their own country, without any prospect of becoming free, when 
purchased from their ov/ners and transported to this country; and 
thirdly, because God decreed them to bondage, and in that decree, 
designated their masters, to wit: the descendants of Shem and 
Japhet, from whom we sprung. 

But even if this were not the case — yet to transport negroes from 
Africa, and to hold them in bondage in this country, is sustained by 
the highest and purest principles of morality and religion. In th« 
first place, the population of Africa is estimated at fifty millions, of 
whom forty millions are in bondage to their own native chiefs and 
color. Secondly, they are barbarians, of the deepest dye and darkest 
liu«, bariog no word, i& their dialects, which meftjis or Bigiiifie* God 



19 

and according* to Sir Charles Anderson (a late Swedish traveler) and 
others, they have no conception of Deity whatever, or of a ra, 
eurrection. or future rewards and punishment. They live virtually 
in a state of nudity, eat worms and insects, sleep on the ground 
in the open air or under the forest growth, like cattle, and frequently 
live on human flesh; for they are cannibals in the true sense of the 
word. Tliey are constantly engaged in war and pillage, and aln'ays 
enslave their captives, which they retain, or kill and eat for food, 
or sell into foreign bondage. 

We make a few extracts from English tra"^eler3, -and others in 
Africa, to demonstrate the foregoing statements, respecting the degrad- 
ed condition of the negro race in their own country. James Edward 
Alexander, II. L. S., daring the years 1836 and 1837, made an excursion 
from the Cape of Good Hope into the interior of South Africa, and the 
countries of the Manaquas, Boschmans, and Hill Damaras, under the 
auspices of the English government and the Koyal Geographical So- 
ciety, which was published in two volumes, from which we first 
extract: 

" I was anxious to a^certain the extent of knowledge among the tribe 
(Damarasj with which I dwelt,-to 1-earn what they knew of themselves, 
and of men and things in general: but they positively knew nothing. 
They did not know one year from another; they only knew that at cer- 
tain times the trees and flowers bloom, and. then rain was expected. 
As to their own age, they knew no more of what it was, than idiots. 
Some even had no name. Of numbers they were ignorant; i'kiW could 
count above five. Above all, they had not the least idea of God or a 
future state." Vol. I, page 126. 

" At Chubeeches, I bought a fine I'ttle Damara boy, for a shepherd, 
of his mother, for two cotton handkerchiefs and two strings of glass 
beads." Page 162. • 

Lander, a modern traveler in Africa says : " "With the negro, affec- 
tion is altogether out of the question. They have no love of country, 
and in general betray the most perfect indifference on being enslaved 
and exiled from their native land." Vol. II, page 208. 

At Katunqua, Lander describes the food to be " such as lizards, rats, 
locusts and caterpillar.-!, which the natives roast, grill, bake and boil.'' 
Page 179. 

" In the forenoon we passed near a spot where a party of Falatahs 
murdered twenty of their slaves, because they had not food sufficient." 
Page 227. 

" We are anxious to leave this abominable place, from the fact that 
a sacrifice of no less than three hundred human beings of both sexes 
is .shortly to take place. YVe often hear the cries of these poor wretch- 
es." Page 58. 

"^ " The Gingo and'Eboe negroes, are cannibals. At Bancore some of 
the pots were found on the fire with human flesh in them. At last we 
came to a place where human arms, legs and thighs, hung upon wood- 
en shambles, and were exposed to sale like butchers' meat." Stead- 
man's Narrati^-e, vol. II, page 267. 



20 

"One most inhuman custom still prevails in this part of Africa, and 
that IS tli'e sacrifice of a number of slaves at the burial of their dead, in 
testimony of the respect in which their memory is held." Osborne's 
Gollectioa of Travels, vol. IT, page 537. 

. "We will only observe, that human flesh is one of their delicacies, 
and that they devour it as the most agreeable dainty. Some of their 
commanders carried young women along with them, some of whom 
were slain almost every day, to gratify this unnatural appetite." Mo- 
dern Universal History, vol. XVI, page 321. 

"With regard to their funeral curemonies, the corpse remains in the 
house till the son, the father, or next of blood, can prccureor purchase 
a slave; who is beheaded at the time the corpse is buried." Family 
Magazine, 1836, page 439.^ 

" Nobody can be permitted to marry, till he can present a human 
headof some other tribe to his proposed bride.' Family Magazine,1836. 

Since England and the United States have abolished the slave trade, 
it has increased in other directions, and its enormities have been dou- 
bled, ■ Instead of being brought under the regenerating influences of 
Christianity, their slaves are now sacrificed at the shrine of friends at 
home, or sold to Pagans, to the Arab tribes, into Egypt, Asia, and 
Turkey in Europe. Mr. Buckhart in his travels in Nubia gives, us 
very full information on the subject. He traveled with- companies of 
slaves and slave merchants, through the deserts of IStujbia, . The chief 
mart of the Egyptian and Arabian slave trade, is Shendj>, and a vil'*- 
lage near Siout, in Egypt, where slaves are collected from various 
tribes and nations in Africa and sold. Mr. Buckhart estimated thai 
five thousand slaves under fifteen years of age, were sold yearly, at 
Shendy alone. He describes the hardships of travel over the desert 
to these points, as extreme. 

Such haa been the condition of Africa from the remotest period of 
time; at all events, since the voyage of Hanno was made, five hun^ 
dred and seventy years before the Christian era. The account of this 
voyage was written in Punic, and deposited in the temple of Moloch, 
at Carthage. It was afterwards translated into Greek, thence into 
English by Dr. Faulkner. See also Humpsal's History of African Set 
tlements, translated from the Punic books of Sallust, and into English 
hy D. Stewart, page 22. 

Henc-?, we must conclude after a full survey of the condition of the 
negroes in Africa, from remote periods, that to purchase them of their 
owners in that country, where they are already in bondage, and liable 
^o be sacrificed in honor of the dead, or eaten for food, and from thence 
to transport them to this country and hold them in bondage— cloth 
ing, feeding, and work ing them — protecting their lives, and instruqtin 
them in the principles of the Christian religion, is a purely moral 
and religious act, and pleasing in the sight of God. And 'that 
the man, or set of men, who could say that the opening* of 



21 

the African slave trade, and the holding of negroes in bondage in thit 
country, are immoral, could have cried fire in the general deluge. 
Yet we know that there are a class of fanatical writers at the North, 
prompted by envy and hatred to the South, who repudiate God's sanc- 
tion of slavery. "We allude principally to Wayland, Channing, and 
Barnes, with whom we will connect the name of Dr. Paley, and pro- 
nounce them all either infidels or 'wilful perverters of holy writ, who 
by their ^v^itings detract from the purity and divinity of the Lord Jesus 
Christ and his Apostles. 

They are either infidels or wilful perverters of holy writ, because 
they deny and pervert the revealed laws of God, and the teachings of 
the Lord Jeeus Christ and his Apostles on the subject of slavery, and 
set up an inward naAitor, claimed to reside in their own minds, as an 
infallible guide, and attempt to reason it out in opposition to divine 
revelation, which they call " the higher law." This constitutes infi- 
delity in the true sense of the term, and renders them liable to the 
above charge. 

They detract from the purity and divinity of the Lord Jesus Christ 
and hia Apostles, because they virtually accuse them of suppressing 
the truth, in not revealing the' sin of slavery, through motives of 
policy or fearr This abominable slander upon the Lord Jesus Christ 
and his Apostles, first promulgated by Dr. Paley, an Englishman, 
from whom Wayland, Channing, and Barnes borrow it, does of ne- 
cessity involve the divinity ol Christ and the divine commission of his 
Apostles, by the inference that they suppressed the will of God on the 
subject of slavery, through motives of policy or fear. The principles 
for which Wayland, Channing, Barnes, and Dr. Palej^ contend, must 
of necessity presume that God has recalled the curse of Canaan, and 
revoked his former decrees on the subject of slavery, and that hence 
the holding of slaves has become sinful. Yet the only evidence that 
they off'er us of this fact, is the teachings of that inward monitor claim- 
ed to reside in their own unbalanced^craniums, while holy writ con. 
vinces us that slavery is an ordinance of God, and that it must con- 
tinue until the end of time. 

We, in the South, therefore, believe it to be our duty to God, to our- 
selves, and to posterity, to perpetuate African slavery, and to extend it as 
a missionary duty. This can only be done by severing all government 
relations with the Northern States, and forming a Southern Confedera- 
cy ofslave States. That a majority of the peopl'eof the Northern States 
have become demoralizcd^on the subject of slavery, cannot be denied 
They are covenant breakers. They deny the equality of the slave 
States in the pfirtnership property of the Union, and repudiate the 



22 

ooufitltutional guarantees for our protection. In all the Northern 
States, the abolition party, now in the majority,have societies formed 
for the purpose of stealing Southern property, not for the love of gain; 
but aimed at the destruction of the Southern people. These societies 
are known to the authorities of the States in which they exi t, and 
are tolerated instead of being put down as thieving bandits, acting in 
violation of the international law of the States and do contribute, 
among other things, to render a longer union with the Northern 
States impossible. 

[Mr. Thrasher continued to'speak at some length — demonstrating 
the necessit of secession and the ability of the South to sustain her- 
self in the new relation.] — Ed. /#^ 



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